Snapchat will let 20 media houses take user Stories to make news Stories

Photo-messaging app Snapchat is expanding its "Our Story" feature to about 20 media partners to enable them to crowd-source images and videos for their own "Snap Stories".

"Our Story" feature collects snaps submitted by Snapchatters from around the globe about a place, an event or a topic from different points-of-view and presents them as a Story for the rest of the community to watch.

A "Story" is a collection of Snaps that play in the order they were taken.

Representational image.

Previously, only Snapchat itself could develop a "Story" using inputs from people and present it to the audiences but now the extension of this feature to the media houses would allow them to weave user-submitted videos into their own stories and add context through graphics or text, Deadline.com reported late on Thursday.

The company would provide its partner, the tools to create "Our Stories" content along with the ability to source publicly submitted snaps and provide editorial data to finalise it.

The feature would be very useful for news organisations to build stories on major news events using first-hand videos and graphics from the Snapchatters witnessing and experiencing the event or incident.

Media partners also will be able to monetise this content right from the start. Snap said it will share the revenue from the content its partners produce, the report added.

Launched in 2015, the feature was designed to take advantage of the internet-connected cameras at the centre of the app to gather eyewitness-video accounts of events, places, or themes and in the past month itself, over 75 million people have watched the "Our Story" content on the discover section of Snapchat.